restaurants

weekend trip to tanglewood!

last wednesday was the inaugural dinner party in my new apartment!!

menu was:

spinach salad with tasty honey dijon dressing (p.s. anyone have a good recipe for that?)
my secret mac and cheese made with applewood smoked bacon, smokey gouda, jalepeno jack, gruyere, white cheddar, and pecorino romano 
an impromptu fruit salad 
lollipops 


it looked a little like this...
the absence of any sort of coffee or dinner table added to the, ermmm, charm?

after dinner, friend aziz got a surprise email from the boston symphony orchestra saying they needed him for a concert STAT! 

...so we packed our things and left for the berkshires...

and you must understand, i love the berkshires.

so much so that i am going to get married right on the tanglewood grounds... if they let me... and if someone actually agrees to marry me... 

and the wedding shall be catered by loeb's. home of best sandwiches in massachusetts. pictured here from left to right are the italian stallion and the leslie b. don't tell anyone, but these little sandwiches are secretly the real reason that i went to tanglewood this weekend. 



i got serenaded by guy tisdale. who then proceeded to throw down on a lil bartok sonata for two pianos and percussions. 



friends aziz and kyky, pre bso concert. aziz was getting ready to tear up some triangle on la valse!

(i also basked in the sounds of brahms 2, beethoven 4, liszt piano concerto number 2, and the brahms piano concerto number i forget. all in one weekend!! it was fabulous. and the tmc orchestra was amazing!!)


 on sunday morning, tim genis took aziz and i out on his swank boat. it was total swank. 

this is tim wake-boarding. you might be asking yourself, "then who is driving the boat??"


...there's a first time for everything.


xoxo

yeh

food and furniture


food: so if i'm not at school practicing between the hours of 11 and 7 on any given weekday, i'm most likely perusing the aisles of fairway market or zabar's. it's this new guilty pleasure that i have... playing hooky to look at food. 

... and so that is what i did today, with the good excuse that the only things in my fridge until today were two half eaten pizzas, soy sauce packets, a bottle of soy sauce, and my beloved mustards that i dared not leave at old apartment. 

i think i'll share some of my fave things to do at fairway and/or zabar's:

pick the cheesemonger's brain about (what else?) cheese. when i moved out of the dorms, mum suggested i try a new cheese every week, so i've been doing just that. this week though, with the arrival of friend aziz (of the famed "mac and cheese with aziz), the departure of friend and future second husband brian, and the homecoming of friend pj, a lot of celebrating is to go down with my very special super duper secret homemade mac and cheese. (in other words, there are about five cheese of the week this week). i scoped out the best emmentaler, gruyere, smokey gouda, pepper jack, and pecorino romano money can buy. sorry, wallet. 

check out what mustards i can add to my ever growing mustard shelf. i once dated a guy that asked me if i ever found myself looking for excuses to put ketchup on things. isn't that an awesome question? i'm probably an average ketchup user, but mustard, oy vey, i could live off of that stuff. the best sandwiches that come out of my kitchen usually involve a different kind of mustard on each slice of bread (and then don't be surprised if i get some of the cafeteria honey mustard (that stuff is the crack of mustard) to dip it in). today i bought a green peppercorn mustard that looked creamy and tasty. 

buy fresh pasta. unless i'm cooking carbonara or mac and cheese, there's no way i'm ever buying dried pasta again. ever. try it the whole wheat kind, i dare you.

sample the knishes. this applies exclusively to zabar's because fairway's knish counter is sorta weak (no offense). when i ask for a sample, i usually get some sort of answer along the lines of, "well we don't normally give knish samples, but for you, i think i can sneak one in." thanks, knish boys :-) the best by far is the spinach and potato. 



today at zabar's i stumbled upon this hilarious object:
the vic firth pepper grinder is no new thing to me, but a zabar's vic firth pepper grinder? oh hellllo! can someone give me a good reason why a percussionist that is an aspiring amateur foodie and also jewish shouldn't have a pepper grinder that was made on the same lathe as 30% of her drum sticks and imprinted with the name of her fave jewish deli? 

unfortunately, i spent all of my money on cheese and had none leftover to buy this beauty.  

furniture: of course one of the best parts about a new apartment is making the customary trek(s) out to ikea! here is my most recent ikea adventure documented in some low-quality cell phone pictures...

raise your hand if you're guilty of having driven out to ikea just to eat the swedish meatballs. i am. 

future second husband, brian, and his tasty princess cake.

i have this thing about stuffed animals- i can never EVER throw them out. but when brian came over and saw that i still had this stuffed hippo that an ex boyfriend gave me sitting in my bed, he hid it and then bought me this goofy looking thing to replace it. according to the tag it's a giraffe. but i thought it was a hippo. and brian thought it was a bunny (seriously.) so the giraffe's name is bunny the hippo. 

brian passed out in the chair on the cart waiting to check out


oops! fairway delivery is here...

xoxo

yeh

eating in la jolla and san diego!


hello, grandmum!

i had a very very VERY lovely lunch at whisknladle in downtown la jolla avec the pops, the grandpops, and the grandmum. 


i had some very fresh and very tasty tagliatelle with bolognese sauce and pops had sweat breads (not my cup of tea, but he enjoyed it, contrary to what you might think given his ridiculous face in above photo). 


by far the best part was dessert: basil gelato, red pepper strawberry sorbet, and cantaloupe tomato sorbet. the basil gelato was to. die. for. the red pepper strawby was a close second (the pepper hit you first, backed off, and then made room for the strawby to create an utterly refreshing sensation), and the cantaloupe tomato was interesting but not my fave.



the cocktail list looked incredible. i picked the waitress' brain about where one finds blueberry lavender vodka and she said that they infuse it right there in the restaurant! ohhhh how i wanted a lavender cosmo almost more than another scoop of basil gelato! but, alas, it was 2 in the afternoon. and, alas, i am twelve. 


friend nick tolle and me about to dig in to some freaking tacos

after the ginterview, i naturally had to try la fachada
although it took some convincing for jason to drive allll the wayyy out there (at times like these, i miss new york subways)


jason, our resident fachada expert, ordered for nick and me- carnitas, carne asada, and chickens tacos. 

they were all so incredibly tasty! the tortillas were so fresh (the lady stands in the truck and makes them righhhht there). the tastes were simple, but seasoned absolutely perfectly! there wasn't all the junk in the trunk like a typical t-bell taco- it was simply the meat and some green things (and some self serve guac and salsa). i think the favorite of the three was the carnitas. 

the horchata was über tasty as well.

do i support jason's decision in saying this would be his last meal on earth? oh, totally. 

the ginterview!



behold, jason!

the basics
name: jason f. ginter
birthday: 01.31.1981
hometown: elyria, oh
occupation: principal timpanist, san diego symphony and president and founder of jg percussion

my name is yeh: welcome!! so i understand that you have a theory on salads on the west coast. they're different from midwest salads, aren't they?
jason ginter: that's right. see, in the midwest, you can make a salad without putting any vegetables in it. you just need mayonnaise. or you can use cool whip, marshmallows, and those little mandarin oranges you get in the can. nothing fresh at all. but if you want to make a california salad, you have to use lettuce and avocado. (that's the way to make anything california- just add avocado).
m: what would your last meal on earth be?
j: a little place in san diego called la fachada mexican restaurant. it's a restaurant and a truck, but i've never eaten at the restaurant, only the truck. 

m: favorite composer? favorite piece?
j: hmmm... sibelius? his second symphony is incredible. i've also been listening to a lot of nielsen. nielsen 4. i also love the beethoven and brahms symphonies. 
m: so you've recently won your job with the san diego symphony. what was your reaction when you were announced as the winner? and what was the first thing that you did?
j: my reaction was... i went into the bathroom and had to sit down because i felt sick. and then i called my mother and she cried on the phone. 
m: and the first drink you had?
j: after the audition, i went back to the hotel and slept for four hours. i woke up, had a steak and a gin and tonic, and then went back to sleep. 
m: many of my friends and i are beginning to take orchestra auditions. can you explain a bit about your audition preparation process?
j: sure. i start three to six months before the audition. for me it was important to find out what was a sustainable amount of practice because when i was younger, i would have days where i practiced twelve hours... and then the next day i would play three, and the next six. it was never consistent. in grad school, i figured out that i could play eight hours a day, seven days a week. so that's what i did to prepare for san diego- eight hours a day for nine months. i took one day off for christmas.
m: wow. what kept you going through all of that?
j: being broke helps.

m: do you have any hobbies?
j: yeah, i have my own business that makes drum sticks and timpani mallets (jg percussion). i also enjoy surfing and driving my vespa around town... 2009 vespa gt 200, baby. 




jason gave me a tour of the jg factory...

m: what was (my former percussion teacher) sarah barnes like in college?
j: she was the girl that everybody wanted to date.

m: words of wisdom for students taking auditions?
j: play the music, not just the drums. if you look at a panel, there are a lot more musicians than just percussionists- there are bassoonists, violinists, trumpet players... so when you play the music and you think about the context in to which we fit, then the music you play makes more sense to all of those other musicians. 
m: why did you win san diego?
j: i was flexible.
m: you do yoga?
j: just pilates.... but... in an audition, it's not about playing things perfect the first time, it's about being able to adjust. you play it well the first time, but if they ask you to play something differently, you do it. orchestra is all about adjusting to what's going on around you.

m: any last words? maximum of ten.
j: molly yeh is my hero. i think she is cool.
(i count the words on my fingers)
m: wow. good for you!


jason and me about to go surfing! (hello, mum!)

friend ryan and me outside the surf shop at ocean beach